


temperament without a tongue

by impossibletruths



Series: cr femslash fest 2k17 [7]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Femslash February, Pining, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-01
Updated: 2017-03-01
Packaged: 2018-09-27 15:27:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10028285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impossibletruths/pseuds/impossibletruths
Summary: In the moment she blushes and stutters and denies it, because she doesn’t even know what a crush is supposed to feel like so how is she supposed to know if she has one? But she keeps coming back to it afterwards, rolling the word around in her mouth like it’s a marble heavy on her tongue, and she likes the shape and weight of it, and the way something inside her ribs twists and flares when she thinks of her, and her wheatgrass hair, and her eyes like the sky, and her neatness, and her surety.(Keyleth discovers, slowly, carefully, that she most loves people who have what she lacks. Confidence especially.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> last day of the cr femslash fest. title from “experience” by ralph waldo emerson
> 
> find me on tumblr at [teammompike](http://teammompike.tumblr.com)

Keyleth falls in love with Allura Vysoren the moment the woman blows past them, all coiled anger and wheatgrass hair and piercing blues, and her robes swirl around her and something in Keyleth’s chest catches and that’s that.

Only she doesn’t quite realize it at first, because love isn’t something she has a lot of experience with (or any experience, actually) and anyways, they’re busy trying to sweet talk and/or threaten their way into the palace to meet with Uriel Tal’dorei. So she just thinks  _oh_ in a detached sort of way and lets the moment pass her by and leave her with a spot of warmth in her chest and a general sort of confusion.

Then Vax calls out, “Good woman!” and the woman slows, stills, smoothes her robes and straightens. She looks them over with a graceful stillness, and Keyleth wouldn’t have known she could cut through them with such force had she not seen it moments before.

“Hello,” she greets them, polite and a little crisp. “If you seek audience with the Sovereign I’m afraid he isn’t taking visitors.” She spits the end of the statement to the guards behind them––who, to their credit, quail a little under the fury of her stare.

“You’ve come to speak with the Sovereign as well?” Vex asks, and the woman closes her eyes to take a deep breath. When she opens them again her gaze is soft, fury faded.

“Sorry, where are my manners? Arcanist Allura Vysoren, of the Tal’Dorei Council.”

“Arcanist Vysoren,” says Vax. “Pleasure to meet you. We’re, uh, the SHITs.”

“You may have heard of us,” Scanlan chimes in.

Keyleth stares at her as her mouth twitches, and then an eggshell smile spreads across her face, and for a dizzying moment Keyleth feels rooted in a way that has nothing to do with the plants she tends.

“No,” Arcanist Vysoren says. “I can’t say I have.”

“Not yet,” Grog corrects, and she laughs.

“What brings a group such as yourselves to speak with the Sovereign?”

“Well,” says Vex, “we hear wonderful things about him, of course, but some of his actions lately––”

“We think something’s wrong,” Keyleth interrupts, and Arcanist Vysoren’s eyes find hers, and that warmth in her chest flares, and she swallows.

“I see,” says the arcanist. “I think you had better come with me.”

* * *

Arcanist Vysoren lives in an ivory tower in the center of the city, and it is bigger on the inside than the outside, and the compressed geometry and geography plays tricks on Keyleth’s senses. She finds herself momentarily dizzy as she steps through the door into such overwhelming space that should not exist.

“Ah, yes,” says Arcanist Vysoren when Keyleth stumbles, and she steadies her with a hand on her shoulder. Keyleth is tall, even among humans, but the arcanist meets her eyes. “It’s a little disorienting the first time. I should have warned you.”

“It’s amazing,” says Keyleth, and she means it, because she has never seen anything like this before, and Arcanist Vysoren smiles, humble.

“Thank you.”

The floor shifts and begins to rise, and they go up, and up, and up, to the very top of this impossibly large tower, and arrive at what seems to be Arcanist Vysoren’s personal quarters, where they speak for a very long time about what has happened in Emon, and how the Sovereign and his family have changed, and what to do about it.

“Well,” suggests Keyleth as the conversations lulls, caught up in circles, “I could scry them.”

“Oh, yes!” Tiberius agrees. “That could be very beneficial. Perhaps, ah, Arcanist Vysoren could help.”

“Oh, yes,” Keyleth agrees, too enthusiastic, and Vex quietly laughs at her but she doesn’t care, because the fragile thing in her chest practically sings. “That would be very helpful. Arcanist Vysoren, would you...?” She turns to the woman, who also seems to be attempting to hide a smile behind her hand.

“Allura, please,” she says. “I will happily lend my aid, if it will help.”

“You know him, right? The Sovereign? And his family?"

“I am on the Council,” Allura reminds her gently, and Keyleth feels herself go pink.

“Right, okay. So you do know him. Okay. Yeah! Let’s do this.”

Keyleth has scried with Pike before, whose magic is soft and a little warm and a little too ephemeral for Keyleth’s comfort. And she has scried with other Ashari, frantic and windswept rituals, like sitting at the eye of a storm.

Scrying with Allura is magic.

Well, of course it’s magic; it’s a magical ritual that requires two participants who know the spell. Anyone and their mother knows that. The point is, Allura holds her hands across their makeshift scrying circle on the desk, scrying sphere drifting slightly in its basin of cooling tea. Keyleth’s own hands feel hot and sweaty against Allura’s cool fingers, and when she closes her eyes and falls into the rhythm of the ritual, Allura’s magic crackles and hums against her own, and Keyleth has felt the storm-magic of the Ashari but this is different, cooler, gentler, and still biting, and for a moment it’s all she can do to focus on the ritual instead of reveling in this brush of power.

She feels her cheeks heat anyways as she drags her attention away from Allura and instead follows the call of the woman’s help, vision snapping forward as Allura guides her to the Sovereigns throne room, where the spell reveals some unfortunate information about demons and the like, and after that she doesn’t have time to think about Allura’s hands firm in hers because there’s rather a lot to do, and they leave Allura’s tower in a whirlwind of hasty goodbyes and thank you’s and the last Keyleth sees of her is the woman standing alone in her rooms, face drawn and still, and the thing in her chest pulls, and Keyleth doesn’t know what to do so she turns around and leaves with everyone else.

* * *

So, yeah, Keyleth doesn’t realize it right away, that the thing in her chest is so closely connected with Allura Vysoren. She still spends fucking ages nursing that little bloom. What of it? She’s a gardening type; nurturing growing things is where she excels. It’s not her fault she can’t figure out the name for it until she’s talking animatedly one night, a little tipsy and rambling on about Allura’s magic, and Vex smirks and says, “Aw, Keyleth’s got a crush.”

So, okay, sure, yeah, Keyleth supposes. In the moment she blushes and stutters and denies it, because she doesn’t even know what a crush is supposed to feel like so how is she supposed to know if she has one? But she keeps coming back to it afterwards, rolling the word around in her mouth like it’s a marble heavy on her tongue, and she likes the shape and weight of it, and the way something inside her ribs twists and flares when she thinks of her, and her wheatgrass hair, and her eyes like the sky, and her neatness, and her surety.

(Keyleth discovers, slowly, carefully, that she most loves people who have what she lacks. Confidence especially.)

But they are a busy group of protoheroes, and it is hard to keep up with anyone or anything when you are running around making political alliances and slaying dragons and saving the emperor from demons. So Keyleth sort of just, lets it sit, warm and familiar in her chest. And then Pike dies, and then they fight the Dread Emperor, and Keyleth kills–– Keyleth kills––

They spend a lot of time apart, after that.

And Keyleth leaves for the Earth Ashari, because she needs time, because she needs guidance, because she needs–– She’s not sure what she needs. A reminder, perhaps, of why she is here, out in the world, making these mistakes.

She doesn’t quite mean to stop by Allura’s tower before she leaves, but her feet drag her there anyways. It stands, whole and unbroken, even though Keyleth knows it came crashing down around them not so long ago.

She knocks, because she doesn’t know what else to do, and stands at the door for an interminable time, long enough to doubt this plan, and herself, and everything that has led her up to this moment, and just as she decides this is a foolish and pointless exercise and turns to go, the door creaks open.

“Keyleth?”

“Allura!”

She has pinned her hair up, braids twisted into buns, and she seems to be wearing a bathrobe rather than her usual attire, and Keyleth now realizes just how early it is. Allura blinks and stifles a yawn rather obviously, jaw working as she tries to mask it, and Keyleth’s mouth goes dry.

“Is something wrong?”

“No! No, I’m just leaving, and I thought I should–– I wanted to say, uh, bye. So, bye.”

Allura blinks once, twice. And then:

“Leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“What–– Why?”

“Not forever! I mean, I’ll come back! I kinda have to, right? Council member.” She grins at that, but it falls flat, mouth refusing to fit into the sickle shape of a smile. “But, uh. I have to continue on my Aramente.”

Allura tugs her robe closer around her and cocks her head slightly. “Do you want to come in for a moment?”

 _Yes_  she thinks, but she shakes her head, and the thing in her chest pulls.

“Uh, no, I shouldn’t.”

“Oh. If you’re sure.” Allura purses her lips as she stares over Keyleth. “Are you alright?”

"Not really,” her traitorous mouth says before her brain can catch up, and her eyes go wide. “I mean, yes! I’m fine! Everything’s fine! I’ll just, uh, be going. Sorry to wake you.”

She makes it four paces––and its _fine_  she’s _going_ ––before Allura sighs, “Keyleth,” and the traitorous thing in her chest grabs her heart and squeezes and she falls still. She turns around slowly, and Allura stares at her from the doorway, still a little rumpled from sleep, and the thing in Keyleth’s chest shouts to the heavens, and oh, now she understands.

“Come back safe, alright?”

“I’ll do my best,” Keyleth promises, because it’s the only truth she can offer, and Allura smiles, a little tired and sad, and says, “Alright then.”

Keyleth turns around and drags herself step by aching step out of the city and does not look back once.

* * *

There is not much by way of peace among the Earth Ashari, only more death, visions and nightmares that cling to her with bloodied hands and leave her gasping and sweating in bed, trapped in the empty space between vision and truth.

She spends long months searching, and studying, and by the time she discovers the understanding she seeks she feels worn away like the earth, eroded. She feels broken open for the world to see, ice water in the cracks of herself, prying into the weak and soft spots beneath her armor.

The last night she stays with them, after the visions and the mediations and the grueling training, she dreams. She dreams she is a snake. She sheds her skin, leaves a peeling, cracked, dull mess of broken scales behind her. The earth burns against her belly, and when she breathes she tastes the open sky above her, and for the first time in many, many months she feels still.

The next day, Patisse declares her studies completed, and sends her on her way, and she walks with a strange lightness, as though she has left behind a great burden, and the soft things within her reach for the sun, and she breathes deep and full and her mind is quiet.

* * *

She spies Allura in Abadar's Promande on a humid summer day, idly peering through the window of a bookshop while Percy barters with a nearby blacksmith, and the thing in her chest burst to life.

It’s easier, now, without the layers to hide behind. She has been letting the quiet things inside her grow; the bloom in her heart is no exception.

“Allura!”

Her head snaps around, and for a moment she stands stone-still in the middle of the street, eyes searching. Her eyes land on Keyleth, standing tall and waving across the boulevard, and her face goes all bright, and she weaves her way through the meandering crowd to join Keyleth against the shop window.

“Keyleth,” she says, and her eyes smile. “Welcome back. How was your trip?”

“Long,” she says, and she laughs around it and thinks she could almost be believed. “I learned a lot,” she says, and that is more honest. Allura nods.

“Such is the way of long journeys.”

“Do you, um, have a lot of experience? With traveling?”

“Some,” Allura allows. “From a long time ago. Not easily forgotten, though.”

Keyleth thinks of grinding stone, and of snakes, and rebirth. “No, I guess not.”

“Would you care for a cup of tea? My shopping is finished and I have some free time.”

Keyleth’s heart jumps. “Yeah, um, I’d love some. Oh, but I’m here with Percy, and––”

“Well,” says Allura, and Keyleth wonders if it’s only in her mind’s eye that Allura’s eyes shutter slightly, “we should invite him along, then.”

“I don’t know when he’s going to be out,” Keyleth admits. “Sometimes he spends hours bartering for goods. He’s got a new project going, you know. So, uh. Maybe we should just. Let him work.”

Allura’s eyes are entirely too knowing. “Very well,” she says. “Shall we, then?”

* * *

The tower has not changed in the months she has been gone. The scale of it still unsettles her. Allura’s hand rests firm on her shoulder.

The tea is sharp and slightly bitter. Allura takes it with two sugars.

“A secret sweet tooth, I’m afraid,” she says when she catches Keyleth staring, and Keyleth feels herself blush, and things would really be better if she could just stop doing that. “Would you care for one?”

“No thank you.”

Allura stirs her tea. Keyleth keeps staring. Allura looks up, and Keyleth watches the question start to form on her face, and, well, fuck it.

“I like you,” she blurts out. “I really like you a lot! And i thought maybe it would go away while I was gone but I didn’t and I still like you and I just thought you should know because it’s kinda shitty not to tell people things like that and just leave it hanging over everyone, at least that’s what everyone says, so–– Yeah.”

And Allura, of all things, laughs.

“I rather figured that out, yes.”

Keyleth deflates. “Oh.”

“Thank you for telling me. I’d hate to think this was all for naught.”

“Oh,” says Keyleth. And then, “ _Oh!”_

“Yes,” Allura agrees.

“Um. Does that mean I–– Can I kiss you?”

“I rather hoped you would,” says Allura, and kissing her––soft and warm electricity, and cool hands against her jaw, and a fury hidden beneath her gentleness––is like magic.


End file.
